Active Member

After hankering after the Tannoy Arena and Kef 3005 "lifestyle" speakers, but rejected teh Tannoys for their mounting issues, and the KEFs for their possibly-questionable performance issues, I have abondoned the idea of lifestyle speakers and have decided to stick with traditional wooden boxes.

I have decided to go with Tannoy Sensys DC2 with teh equivalent Sensys centre.

Is there anything wrong with having them for both fronts and rears? Only I listen to SACD's and they recommend identical speakers all-round. The reason I ask is, 5.1 traditional design speaker packs with floorstanders always coem with bookshelf speakers at the back.

Active Member

i wouldn't think there is anything wrong with using floorstanders as rears. i use then for fronts, rears and surrounds as i have the space. i do however set them all to small and let the sub deal with the bass frequencies.

Active Member

You should have identical speakers at all positions if you read the specs for surround sound to the letter. What mounting issues did you find with the Tannoy, I use them a lot as they are a fantastic package?

Active Member

I liked the tannoy arena speakers, but both their wall-mounts and floor stands were expensive. That wasn't prohibitive in itself, but added to the fact that the floorstands made them look like weird aliens, they wouldn't have gone in my modern-cosy feel room. As for teh wall-mounts, there is no practical way I could have wall-mounted them without hiding the wires.

As my room is larger than average, I thought I'd go for the floor-standing option as they naturally hide the hanging wire, and their is no cost in the stand.

The major reason was that I can't think of any lifestyle speakers under a grand or over for that matter that could possibly compete with tannyo dc2's front and rear.

On a separate note, I would have thought it would have been natural to set teh speakers to large (for SACD listening in particular) with floorstanders....so as to ensure the upper-bass frequencies would retain some of their directionality????? Although I'm no expert.

P.S. I already have a velodyne sub that I woudl have sold had I have gone for teh lifestyle 5.1 option, but I will use this with the Tannoys.

Active Member

The other thing, is I know I should have teh exact same speaker for centre for strict SACD reproduction, but this system will double up as major home theatre system - moreso in fact. Plus, it's impractical to have a floorstander for a front!!!! Otherwise I woudl have got it you know, and made a snazzy 6.1 system!!!!!!